Go ahead and raise Wright. I'll see you Palin's witchhunter and raise you two lunatics from the lower 48 whose endorsements McCain sought until he realized they backfired.

Responding to your charge about the "silence of the Dems", there are some for whom that's an accurate charge, but you condemn wrongly with a broad stroke. I have frequently heard Democratic office holders and candidates condemn torture. I can't recall exactly when, but I have heard the word "torture" spoken by Obama. I specifically recall both Biden and John Kerry condemning it in their speeches at the Democratic convention.

To letter writers who said we miss these stories because we're so focused on the election, while there's some truth to that, its also the case that corporate media won't pick up the story when people in power won't speak of it, which mean the Bush administration. We know by now the bushies aren't amenable to shame or condemnation on human rights grounds. They'll ignore letters or street protests. The only thing that will move them is being blasted at the ballot box. We focus on the election because we have to win if we want to do anything about torture or anything else. So just let this motivate you to help a worthy candidate.

Every writer missed the point. It isn't the hypocrisy that these same people hounded John Edwards over a haircut, or that it seems wasteful to spend that much money for clothes and makeup. Legitimate points, but the big thing is that it's illegal to use campaign funds for personal spending. The clothes are no different than using campaign funds to buy a car or build an extension on to the candidate's house. The writers also missed that this fits a pattern with the revelations that she takes per diem for staying at home, and uses the state travel budget for first class travel for personal trips. This indicates she'll she the federal budget as her piggy bank.

I've been thinking a lot about Wellstone this past month as Obama has built a lead, and as his supporters have been warned against complacency. Some commenters said Wellstone was the only or the first politician they ever donated to or volunteered for. He was the first I ever cried for. Minnesota Democrats learned in a terrible way that an election can change completely in the time it takes a news announcer to say, "we've received reports that Sen Wellstone's plane has crashed." I recall hearing it when I left work early one day and had the radio tuned to Minnesota Public Radio. Wellstone was confirmed dead by the time I got home, where I woke my and told her what had happened. She had gotten to actually meet Wellstone maybe a couple weeks before, at an event where she walked up to him and gave him a hug, which he responded to as if he knew her. I still get teary when I recall how she wailed. I'm even having some trouble writing this right now.

Probably everyone reading this knows how that election went. You won't know how viscerally Minnesota Democrats still feel it. At a recent fundraiser for a local candidate, a group Democrats, strangers to each other, talked about the current election of course, but we inevitably turned to which of us still have our "Wellstone!" bumper stickers or yard sign. Our talk of the current election veered not a bit into what we should with our certain win, because there was no sense of certainty. Hope, sure, but also a dread that something had to go wrong, as something has gone wrong so many elections before, something unforeseeable, uncontrollable, and devastating.

So I promise all Obama supporters, in Minnesota at least, there is no complacency. Anyone outside Minnesota who thinks the only question is the size of Obama's landslide, I have two words for you: Paul Wellstone. So keep working. Keep scrapping for every last vote.

I doubt the vote flipping represents real fraud, since that would presumably be hidden by the voter. However, even if nothign malicious is being done, that fact these machines have problems we can see leaves no confidence the parts we can't see don't have problems too. So yes, we need to ban them, but that's hardly all we need to do. The real election fraud is happening with the voter registration rolls and challenge lists. The election is being stolen mostly by stopping people from getting to the voting machine in the first place. These practices need to be ended as part of larger reform, which needs to be high priority for the new administration and Congress. We need to include, with the admission I'm probably missing something:

Abolish unauditable voting.

Nationwide election day registration.

Better yet, replace current registration with something automatic, like in other countries where people can just show up at the polls and be on the lists.

Abolish exact match laws.

Standardize ballot design nationwide.

Prohibit caging lists.

Prohibit challenges based on foreclosure lists.

Prohibit challenges without knowledge by the challenger.

Start punishing people who knowingly mislead voters regarding polling places, dates and times, etc.

Replace the Electoral College with a popular vote